Painted Diagrams

Whether it’s an organigram in the office, a fever curve in the hospital or election results on TV, diagrams are omnipresent. We encounter them at every turn in our daily lives; they influence our visual experience. There is hardly a newspaper or news programme that doesn’t feature them as infotainment. The demand for “facts, facts, facts” that a news magazine made several years ago could just as well be “pictures, pictures, pictures” today. Whenever we want to explain something or convince others, we try to package the facts and figures into images. Diagrams are images whose purpose is to present statistical figures and proportions of size – highly abstract images created with minimal means. This is exactly how one could describe numerous works of Concrete Art. The previously unrecognised parallels between infographics and art is the focus of an exhibition by the Museum für Konkrete Kunst (MKK) in Ingolstadt which reveals that the similarities are based on far more than vague impressions. The title of the exhibition refers to a concept proposed by the Bauhaus student Margaret Camilla Leiteritz who created what she called “painted diagrams” based on scientific illustrations. The exhibition highlights the remarkable relationship between infographics and art which has existed since the Bauhaus. The presentation features artworks by some thirty international artists and includes several historical pieces as well. The question of whether infographics can truly be neutral or unbiased is one of great social relevance. Art and infographics – both mutually influencing – strongly determine how we present our worldviews. In a digitalised future with ever increasing masses of data, these images will increasingly serve as the basis for discussing “facts” with one another.

Artistic directors: Theres Rohde & Simone Schimpf